Bringing greater value to the hedge fund desktop

Tuesday, 24 June, 2014
by Adam Walhout

Client insistence on ever-greater investment returns has served as a source of pressure for hedge funds, investment capital firms and trading boutiques to keep a tight lid on fees – and by extension their own operating costs. And nowhere is this pressure on costs more intense than in the area of market data, where the cost of premium desktop services are second only to the cost of human traders themselves.

The end of softed market data terminals?

This pressure is about to become more intense as regulators like the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) begin to require more transparency with respect to broker fees. One consequence of these initiatives will be the likely itemisation of market data services provided under soft commission arrangements with buy-side firms, and the requirement that these firms foot the bill themselves for the market data services they consume.

What are hedge funds really willing to pay for?

It’s highly probable that this development will force a decision point among buy-side firms that have heretofore enjoyed potentially over-dimensioned premium desktop services essentially free of charge.

Forced to pay premium rates for packaged trader desktop services, hedge funds and other small to medium-sized buy-side institutions will start to take a closer look at what they really need, use and are willing to pay for.

There are viable alternatives to legacy premium desktops

Fortunately, there are now viable and indeed compelling alternatives to the legacy premium desktops often used almost by default within the buy side with little thought of their true utility or value for money.

Pay only for what you actually need

Emerging players like Infront are able to step up to the plate, offering buy-side users all the coverage and functionality they need, with the benefit of more agile technology platform and arrangements.

Infront provides a comprehensive, easy-to-deploy trader desktop platform with and a highly versatile, modern user interface and seamless mobile integration. Its modular design and commercial terms mean that buy-side firms can select the functions and data sets they require, rather than being tied into broad contracts for packaged services they don’t need.